Based on eyewitness written accounts. In the 17th century, a Bulgarian Christian region is selected by the Ottoman rulers to serve as an example of conversion to Islam. A Janissary who was kidnapped from the village as a boy now serving the Ottoman sultan is sent to force the reluctant inhabitants to convert. The Bulgarian christians have to chosebetween physical annihilation and losing their spiritual identity. Ultimately torture, violence, and rebellion break out. Based on real events and the novel "Time of Parting" (Vreme Razdelno) by Anton Donchev.The novel is based on two individual eyewitness written accounts - by the priest Aligorko and the Venetian. The resulting text is a translation of the original French and Old Bulgarian (Old Church Slavonic) texts. All names, characters and events appear in the originalmanuscripts.The year is 1668. The Ottoman Turkish jihad is in its heat in Southeastern Europe.The Turkish siege of the Venetian fortress of Candia (now Heraklion in Crete) has been lasting for a second decade now. The Rhodope Mountain is seen as a strategically important base of the war but its Christian population is a potential source of instability. The sultan orders its conversion into “the right faith”. The sacred forests and valleys, where according to the legend Orpheus was born, now screams under the Yataghans enforcing the foreign creed in blood and fires. A regiment of Spahis commanded by the Janissary Karaibrahim is assigned to the valley of the river Elindenya.Whenthe locals refuse to convert, the violence begins. One by one the villagers are killed. One is impaled and still alive as his body hangs from the pole; another one torn in half; a third one beheaded. When the Christians tell the occupier, Suleyman, that even if he forcefully converts people they can’t carry Allah truthfully in their hearts. Suleyman replies that he doesn’t care if they don’t carry...